Stone tool unearthed in Oregon may date back 15,800 years or more

A stone tool believed to be 15,800 years old or older and with bison blood on it, has been excavated from deep under the earth’s surface in Oregon, archaeologists announced. If the scraper, made from orange agate, is that old it is one of the earliest signs of habitation ever found in the Americas.

Archaeologists found the scraper digging underneath a layer of volcanic ash from a Mount St. Helens volcanic eruption of about 15,800 years before the present.

Ancient bison skeleton from the La Brea tar pits in California (Cory Doctorow photo/Wikimedia Commons)